CHAPTER 20: THE NIGHT ETHAN DIED
1521 Words
The room stopped breathing.
At least that’s what it felt like.
Everything around me went silent after Adrian’s words.
> “It wasn’t an accident either.”
For a second, I genuinely thought I had heard him wrong.
Not because the sentence was unclear.
Because my mind refused to accept it.
I stared at him across the small recreated bedroom while the underground facility trembled around us.
The warm yellow light suddenly felt sickening.
Fake.
Like the room itself had been built to soften horrible truths.
“What did you just say?”
My voice barely sounded human.
Adrian looked like he already regretted speaking.
But it was too late now.
The truth was out.
Eva slowly stepped backward, watching both of us carefully like she already knew this conversation could destroy everything.
“Adrian,” she warned quietly.
But he ignored her.
His eyes stayed locked on mine.
And somehow that made it worse.
Because he wasn’t hiding anymore.
“I said Ethan’s crash was planned.”
The words hit like a knife sliding slowly between my ribs.
“No.”
I shook my head immediately.
“No, you’re lying.”
“I wish I was.”
Anger exploded through me so suddenly it almost felt good.
Something hot.
Alive.
Finally stronger than confusion.
“You don’t get to say things like that calmly!”
My voice cracked through the room.
The walls shook again somewhere far outside, but I barely heard it anymore.
All I could hear was my own heartbeat.
And Ethan’s laugh echoing inside my memory.
Summer sunlight.
His hand in mine.
The way he used to call me “Lina” when he wanted to annoy me.
Real memories.
Not Lazarus fragments.
Real.
I looked at Adrian again.
And suddenly I hated him for knowing parts of my life I didn’t even remember myself.
“How long?” I whispered.
His expression tightened.
“How long what?”
“How long did you know?”
Silence.
That silence again.
Always before pain.
“Since the beginning,” he answered quietly.
The rage inside me turned cold instantly.
Beginning.
God.
Everything always came back to beginnings with him.
I laughed weakly, but there was no humor left in me anymore.
“So Ethan dies…”
My throat tightened painfully.
“I try to kill myself…”
Another memory flashed sharply.
Dark bathroom floor.
Pills scattered everywhere.
My mother screaming my name through the locked door.
Then hospital lights.
Machines.
Strangers.
And Adrian standing at the foot of my hospital bed for the very first time.
Watching me.
Studying me.
I nearly lost my balance.
Eva caught my arm carefully.
“Easy.”
I pulled away immediately.
“No.”
My voice shook.
“Don’t tell me to be easy.”
Nobody answered.
Because there was nothing easy left in this story anymore.
I looked back at Adrian.
“You knew me before Lazarus.”
“Yes.”
“You watched me after Ethan died.”
“Yes.”
“You knew the crash wasn’t real.”
His jaw tightened.
“Yes.”
Every answer felt like another fracture spreading through my chest.
Then finally I asked the question I was most afraid of.
“Did you have something to do with it?”
Silence.
Long silence.
Too long.
My stomach dropped instantly.
“No…”
Adrian stepped forward quickly.
“Not directly.”
The answer shattered something inside me.
Not directly.
Meaning yes.
Meaning no.
Meaning complicated.
I hated complicated.
“What does that even mean?”
His voice lowered.
“It means I didn’t order the crash.”
“But you knew about it.”
Another silence.
God.
I wanted to scream.
Instead tears burned behind my eyes again.
“You let him die.”
Adrian’s face collapsed quietly after hearing that.
“You think I don’t hear that in my head every day?”
The pain in his voice caught me off guard.
Real pain.
Not defensive.
Not manipulative.
Pain.
Eva looked away again.
Like she couldn’t stand being inside this conversation anymore.
I stared at Adrian through blurry vision.
“Why Ethan?”
Adrian swallowed hard.
Then finally answered:
“Because Lazarus wanted you.”
The room went still.
My chest tightened painfully.
“What?”
“You were already part of early neurological studies after your father’s research was discovered.”
I froze instantly.
“My father?”
Adrian nodded once.
Another memory flashed.
My father sitting at a desk covered in medical papers.
Me asking:
> “Why do you work so much?”
And him smiling softly before answering:
> “Because memory is the only thing death can’t fully erase.”
The memory vanished.
My breathing became uneven.
“No way…”
Adrian continued quietly.
“Your father developed the first emotional continuity theory years before Lazarus existed.”
I shook my head slowly.
“You’re saying my father created this?”
“No,” Adrian said quickly. “He created the possibility of preserving emotional memory after death.”
A pause.
“Lazarus weaponized it.”
The room suddenly felt colder.
Everything in my life was connected to this project somehow.
My father.
Ethan.
Me.
Even Adrian.
Like none of us ever had a chance to live normally.
Another violent tremor shook the facility.
The ceiling cracked loudly above us.
Eva looked up immediately.
“We are seriously running out of time.”
But I couldn’t move yet.
Not while pieces of my life were still rearranging themselves into horror.
I looked toward the old photos again.
Ethan smiling beside me.
Alive.
Happy.
A future we thought we had.
Then another memory returned suddenly.
The night of the crash.
Rain everywhere.
Ethan driving.
My phone vibrating.
Unknown number.
A message.
> “Don’t go home tonight.”
My breath caught sharply.
I remembered.
“Oh my God.”
Adrian noticed instantly.
“What?”
I looked at him slowly.
“There was a message.”
His expression changed immediately.
“What message?”
“Before the crash.”
The memory sharpened painfully.
I grabbed my head hard.
“It said not to go home.”
Eva frowned.
“Who sent it?”
I squeezed my eyes shut.
Trying harder.
The rain.
The road.
Ethan laughing because I looked nervous.
Then headlights.
Too bright.
Too sudden.
And just before impact—
Another memory surfaced.
A symbol glowing briefly on the side of the truck that hit us.
A black circle crossed through the middle.
Lazarus.
I gasped violently.
“It was them.”
Adrian looked like he already knew.
“They were trying to isolate you after the crash.”
My chest tightened.
“No…”
Eva stared at him sharply.
“You think they planned Ethan’s death just to psychologically destabilize her?”
Adrian didn’t answer immediately.
Which was terrifying.
Then finally:
“Yes.”
The room fell silent again.
Not ordinary silence.
The kind that changes you permanently.
I felt sick.
Actually sick.
Because suddenly Ethan’s death wasn’t random tragedy anymore.
It was strategy.
A step in a larger design.
And somehow…
that hurt even worse.
Tears blurred my vision completely now.
“They destroyed my life before I even knew they existed.”
Adrian stepped closer carefully.
“Yes.”
I looked at him sharply.
“And you still worked for them.”
That hit him hard.
Good.
Because I needed him to hurt too.
“I was twenty,” he whispered. “I thought Lazarus could save people.”
“And when did you realize it couldn’t?”
His eyes met mine.
“The day I saw what they did to you after your first reconstruction.”
A cold feeling spread through me.
“What did they do?”
Adrian looked away briefly.
“Things I still can’t forgive myself for allowing.”
The answer terrified me more than details would have.
Because the imagination is crueler than explanation sometimes.
The room shook violently again.
This time the lights flickered almost completely out.
Smoke drifted beneath the door now.
Eva moved toward the exit urgently.
“We leave. Right now.”
But before any of us could move—
A soft electronic beep echoed somewhere inside the room.
All three of us froze.
The sound came from beneath the desk near the window.
Adrian’s expression darkened immediately.
“No…”
He rushed toward it and pulled open a hidden compartment.
Inside was a small black recorder.
Still active.
Still recording.
My blood ran cold.
Someone had been listening to everything.
The device crackled softly.
Then a familiar calm voice echoed through the tiny speaker.
The Director.
> “Emotional truth increases memory integration exactly as predicted.”
Adrian crushed the recorder instantly beneath his boot.
But too late.
Because another voice suddenly echoed throughout the entire facility.
Cold.
Mechanical.
Final.
> “VERSION FOUR FULLY AWAKENED.”
Every light in the room turned blood red.
Then the underground doors all around us unlocked at the same time with loud metallic clicks.
And somewhere deep below the facility…
something started moving toward us.
chapter 21 coming soon...........
- Writer
